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Abstract: In an effort to become more resilient and contribute to saving water and other resources, people
become more interested in growing their own food, but do not have sufficient gardening experience and
education on conserving water. Previous work has attempted to develop resilient smart gardens that
support the user in automated watering using simple embedded boards. However, none of these solutions
proved to be scalable nor are they easy to replicate for people at home. We set up a student team project
that created a safe space for exploring this multidisciplinary domain. We developed a smart resilient
garden kit with Internet-of-Things devices that is easy to rebuild and scale. We use a small-scale board
and a number of sensors connected to a planter. In this paper, we report on a prototypical implementation
for multidisciplinary smart garden projects, our experiences with self-guided implementation and
reflection meetings, and our lessons learned. By learning about water conservation using automation
on a small scale, students develop a sense for engineering solutions regarding resource limitations
early on. By extending such small projects, they can prepare for developing large-scale solutions for
those challenges.
1. Introduction
According to William Rees, “Resilience science is based on the simple premise that change is
inevitable and that attempts to resist change or control it in any strict sense are doomed to failure” [1]
(p. 5). He adds that, in order to achieve that, development strategies have to abandon efficiency and
maximization as primary goals in favor of social equity and ecological stability [1]. As we are observing
global effects of climate change in phenomena such as frequent flooding, droughts, and heat waves,
developing these strategies is becoming urgent. The mentioned effects directly and indirectly impact the:
(i) environment, i.e., changes in soil fertility and the growth patterns of plants and local landscapes [2–4];
(ii) economy, i.e., the need for financial aid due to drought [5]; and (iii) society, i.e., increased food
and water prices due to greater demand [6]. For example, parallels can currently be seen in California,
where the occurrence of droughts and intense heat waves has increased [7]. To become more resilient to
future climate conditions [8], create a greener society, save money, and improve food quality [9], many
individuals are practicing home horticulture. Home horticulture is the nonprofessional cultivation of
plants for recreation, personal health, cost savings, and environmental and social benefits [2,10,11].
Though mitigating climate change is a motivation to learn home horticulture, individuals still need
to reduce their outdoor water consumption. Research indicates that individuals consume more water
during outdoor activities such as gardening than during indoor activities due to a lack of knowledge
about water usage [12]. Domene et al. [13] argue that garden watering could account for up to a third
of household water consumption yearly and close to 50% of total consumption in the summer [13].
Caetano et al. [14] (p. 566) state, “too little water will retard plant growth and reduce quality, while too
much will leach fertilizers and reduce aeration”. Adequate watering dictates the quality of the harvest,
which is why we try to facilitate it by an automation that protects the user from overwatering (wasting
resources) and protects the plants from drought.
To reduce an individual’s outdoor water usage, researchers and practitioners have developed
automated watering systems [14–16]. However, there have been no scalable, affordable, or easily
replicated solutions for people at home who lack technological skills. Attari et al. [17] report that
participants in their study were ready to simply reduce their usage rather than explore efficient
solutions because of the additional expense involved in controlling water consumption through
an acquired, efficient system. Research also indicates that do-it-yourself (DIY) solutions enhance
consumer’s desire by increasing their pleasure and sense of individualism while saving them
money [18]. Therefore, the challenge is to find an affordable, scalable solution that can reduce the
cognitive effort and cost while closing the gaps for gardeners with limited technological and home
horticulture experience.
The objective of our research was to develop the prototype of an affordable resilient smart garden
education kit that teaches students how to embed technology in a gardening environment to monitor
and support the natural growth of vegetables. We applied an action research approach in the context
of an undergraduate summer project.
The research question that we are investigating for the project in this article is:
What are the insights from and challenges for developing a small-scale resilient smart garden from
scratch using off-the-shelf components and permaculture principles?
2. Background
A closer look at the related work shows that the majority has looked at water conservation
projects, resilient smart garden projects and systems used for farming, gardening help systems,
micro-controller do-it-yourself (DIY) projects and educational kits for gardening. The referenced
projects are summarized in Table 1 and described in detail in the following subsections.
residents with limited IT background to set up a cheap and simple way to monitor and reduce the
water they used for irrigation. The project consisted of a moisture sensor, a real-time clock module,
and a micro-controller.
All of these projects use micro-controller boards and maker ideas to install water-saving
interventions. The proposed Resilient Smart Garden project draws upon these maker principles
and applies them to save irrigation water for a small vegetable garden.
All of these projects have similar approaches to implementing an automatically watering garden.
The Resilient Smart Garden shares some characteristics to minimize water usage while maintaining
a sustainable environment for the plants, but goes beyond the pure DIY implementation.
Practices like permaculture (the eco-, human-sustainable design for permanence) advocate for
similar ideologies, e.g., apply self-regulation and accept feedback [37]. Although independently
ensured food and resource security is an important step in becoming self-sufficient, this transition
requires a great time investment to learn these methodologies and their implementation. There is a set
of twelve main principles that are observed in permaculture [37]: (1) observe and interact; (2) catch
and store energy; (3) obtain a yield; (4) apply self-regulation and accept feedback; (5) use and value
renewable resources and services; (6) produce no waste; (7) design from patterns to details; (8) integrate
rather than segregate; (9) use small and slow solutions; (10) use and value diversity; (11) use edges
and value the marginal; and (12) creatively use and respond to change. We discussed the principles
and their application in our project with the research assistants during the design phase.
In permaculture, a garden built of plant guilds can foster human independence from
extraneous materials and promises to deliver the highest harvest yield while making keeping the
grounds sustained [20].
Garden system had already been built as a senior project by a student team in the Fall semester of
2016 [38] and was expanded upon by a different team in Spring 2017. Four of the students who worked
on the preliminary work continued as research assistants over the summer to fully implement the
prototype. This article contributes an extension of the results presented at the LIMITS workshop
2018 [39]. Specifically, this article expands on the permaculture perspective, the data reporting,
the qualitative analysis of the reflective essays, and the discussion of future avenues building on
this prototype.
3. Research Design
keeps potential pests, e.g., snails, at bay with its strong fragrance [20]. The ten plants are planted in
two planter boxes each monitored by one micro-controller board.
In addition to the embedded part, a web app provides the front-end user interface where the
gardener interacts with the setup of the garden. This includes a companion-gardening design feature
that helps the inexperienced gardener to put together the plants, as in the above tomato-basil example.
Imagine a zoom-in in Google Maps with a layover of plants that can be dragged and dropped on
a garden design canvas. The user receives a list of proposed plants that grow well in that specific area
plus feedback on whether a plant grows well next to the plant it is being dropped on the map [40].
Furthermore, users can review the graphics of the measured data over time and adjust the automatic
watering. They can see their garden’s history and compare data over time and they can opt in to make
their data visible to other gardener’s using the same web app so they can learn from or be inspired by
other designs. This way the platform can grow into an educational tool that gets better over time as
more users provide their data.
1. For each planter, make two rectangular holes of the dimesions 0.5 cm height times 1.5 cm width
on the two opposite holes to attach the humidity and temperature sensors.
2. Drill a smaller hole along the other two walls of the planter.
3. Put the five feet vinyl tube and arrange it along the interior side of the planter. Use zip ties to tie
it to the planter and then use the plugs to seal one end of each vinyl tube. Then, use the pins to
poke small holes along the vinyl tube to let the water spray towards the plants through these
holes.
4. Attach the water pump to the other end of each vinyl tube and place the water pumps connected
to the vinyl tube into the bucket.
5. Place the plants in the planters, fill the planter with soil and place the moisture sensor directly
into the soil in the middle of the planter. Finally, put an LED strip on the wall of the planters.
readings from the micro-controller to send to a server to store the data. The power relays is controlled
by the micro-controller and activates the water pump when the moisture sensor readings is below
a certain value.
The project enclosure is made from the cardboard shipping box the electronics came in.
The cardboard box has a width of 7.25 inches, length of 10 inches, and height of 3.25 inches. Two of
the cardboard box flaps at the bottom with the longest length will be cut to repurpose it as a mount
for the electronics. There are four electronic mounts in total: two for the pair of micro-controller and
power relay, one for the power terminal block, and the last for the nodeMCU. Holes were made on the
box flaps to match the mounting holes in the electronics, which are fastened into place using a screw,
standoff, and nut. The bottom of the project enclosure is duct taped along the edges both inside and
outside to seal it from potential water. Rubber feet were also added to the bottom to further prevent
water from entering the project enclosure by raising it from the surface.
The temperature/humidity sensor, moisture sensor, and power relay will be wired to the
micro-controller. The temperature/humidity sensor is digital and needs three wires for power (VCC),
ground (GND), and data (DATA). VCC is connected to the micro-controller’s 5 V pin, GND to GND,
and DATA to an available digital pin. The moisture sensor is analog and needs three wires for VCC,
GND, and OUT. VCC is connected to the micro-controller’s 5 V pin, GND to GND, and OUT to
an available analog pin. The power relay needs three wires for VCC, GND, and SIGNAL. VCC is
connected to the micro-controller’s 5 V pin, GND to GND, and SIGNAL to an available digital pin.
The nodeMCU communicates with the server to send garden sensor readings that are retrieved
from the micro-controller through I2C protocol. I2C communication requires two pins for serial data
(SDA) and serial clock (SCL). There are dedicated pins on the micro-controllers for I-squared-C (I2C)
communication: pin D2 for SDA and pin D1 for SCL on the nodeMCU and pin A4 for SDA and
pin A5 for SCL on the micro-controller. The nodeMCU operates at 3.3 V and the micro-controller
operates at 5 V; therefore, a logic level converter is needed for communication between the nodeMCU
and micro-controller. The logic level converter needs a power source from the nodeMCU and the
micro-controller to use as a reference.
The power relay activates the water pumps which is controlled by the micro-controller. The water
pumps are off by default when the power relay is not activated. The water pumps are powered by
a 12 V one Ampere power supply that are controlled by the power relay. A circuit is made from
the power supply, the water pump, and the power relay. The positive wire from the power supply
connects to the common (C) pin in the power relay. The water pump positive power wire is connected
to the normally open (NO) pin on the power relay. The negative power wire from the water pump is
connected to the negative power wire from the power supply.
The electronics are powered from the power strip that includes two power plugs and three USB
type A plugs. The pair of micro-controllers is powered through the USB type A plugs using a USB type
B to USB type A cable. The nodeMCU is powered by the last USB type A plug using a USB Micro-B
to USB type A cable. The pair of power relays share power from the 12 V 1 A power supply that is
plugged into the power strip. The power is distributed using a terminal power block that has at least
three rows: one from the power supply and two for the pair of power relays.
The micro-controller and nodeMCU use the Arduino IDE development environment to implement
code and upload sketches onto the micro-controllers. The WiFi Module ESP8266 package needs to
be installed into the Arduino IDE using Boards Manager in order to develop, compile, and upload
sketches onto the nodeMCU. The ESP8266 package can be accessed on the Arduino IDE by including
a link to the package in the Preferences menu. All libraries used for WiFi communication on the
nodeMCU is included with the ESP8266 package. The ArduinoJson library is used on the nodeMCU
to format the sensor readings in Java Script Object Notation (JSON) format to send it to the server.
The ArduinoJson library can be obtained through the Arduino IDE Manage Libraries.
Sustainability 2018, 10, 2654 11 of 25
5. Results
This section provides a qualitative analysis of the implementation of the project as it occurred in
summer 2017, an overview of our data, and the observations we made.
Got a set of rubber ducks for the lab for rubber duck debugging [43]. They have names
Day Zero: Ducks everywhere
and make people smile when they enter the lab.
Worked on shopping lists for both garden and hardware components. Finding planters
22 May, Shopping and soil was relatively easy. Finding the prices for seedlings online was more tricky for
the cost estimation, as many of them weren’t listed.
Included some soldering and WiFi module research. The students were so motivated
Memorial Day, Remote Work
for the project to even put in work on a holiday.
Sustainability 2018, 10, 2654 12 of 25
Table 2. Cont.
We did not have power tools, a power drill specifically, on hand. We had to manually
5 June, Irrigation system make holes using scissors, screwdriver, and wire cutters. We made use of whatever we
had available at any given time.
Attempting to get the garden system to communicate with the server has a snag with
the campus WiFi. The school is using WPA2 Enterprise encryption and PEAP protocol
7 June, WiFi problems for user and password authentication. The current stable library for the WiFi module
does not support this feature. Temporary solution: Tethering over phone. We now
found a permanent solution using a library.
Only 1 of the 4 lettuces initially planted in the planters is alive, and currently struggling.
We found a few pests: vine lice were found on the chives in planter 2, a cocooned
19 June Pests detected
caterpillar (Shield) was found on the leaves of the lettuce in planter 1, and a caterpillar
(Little Jerkwad) ate a good portion of the leaves of the carrots in planter 1.
Vinegar, get the damn pests away. That worked only partially, and one plant died
21 June, Pest control
supposedly because of too much vinegar sprayed.
Opening the door revealed a big flood on the floor and an empty water bucket. My first
22 June, First flood
reaction is to turn off the power strip.
Online research suggests that having capacity constantly powered in a moist
27 June, Partial solution environment will enhance the corrosion on the capacitor. We minimized the time the
sensors are powered.
It turns out that the temperature/humidity sensor was mounted upside down,
which flipped the polarity causing a short. Remounting the temperature/humidity
5 July, Project enclosure
sensor is unfortunately not an easy option for us, so we flipped the wiring on the
micro-controller and breadboard instead.
In the afternoon, a video team from IEEE Computer Society came in and interviewed us
19 July, Press coverage while taking B-Roll shots of the garden and the system. The project got more attention
than we expected.
Tomatoes in planter 2 are beginning to split open. We picked them. At this point, the
31 July, Harvest
plant also had too little room and started to deteriorate.
Figure 3. Garden with LED strip, ripe tomatoes, and research assistants.
Due to the corroded water sensors that flooded the lab and threw off the water measuring,
we have no insights on potential water savings with our system. In Figure 5, we show a little extract
of the sensor readings from our database. It shows the sensor readings of temperature, humidity,
and moisture over an interval of two hours. We chose the interval of two hours as opposed to a longer
time period because, due to the air conditioning in the building, we had very little fluctuation in the
Sustainability 2018, 10, 2654 15 of 25
moisture levels as well as the temperature and humidity levels. In order to gain more insight from this
data, we need a comparative study that takes place outdoors, which is one of the steps in future work
planned for Fall 2018.
Figure 5. Sensor readings for one planter over a two-hour period (created using [44]).
New Skills. Students embraced the opportunity for acquiring new skills, related to the project in terms
of hardware design, embedded technology, and gardening skills, but also beyond, e.g., as expressed by
one of them: “This project was also valuable in teaching me life skills including project management,
time management, self management, and learning to adapt to unforeseen circumstances.”
Freedom in Team Work. They appreciated the leeway they were given to self-organize: “Having
a general timeline provided us direction for the summer research project while not restricting the
approach to meeting the timeline specifications or intrude with our team’s culture or methods of
productivity.” In addition, they “were able to divide the work between everyone and everyone tried to
get their assigned tasks done on time. The dynamic also carried over from the spring semester so there
was never a dull moment.”
Safe-to-fail. The students learned that research may require several attempts at accomplishing
something, as “in research things are expected to (sometimes) go wrong and it is part of the process of
improving the system and finding what works best.” Furthermore, the team was helping in recovering
from setbacks: “When something happened with the garden, it was treated as more of an adventure
than a tragedy. We were all able to laugh it off and then try to work and figure out what was going on
with the system.”
Pain Points. The restrictiveness of the wireless network, the tediousness of acquisition reimbursements,
and the requested documentation were the identified pain points: “Honestly, I disliked documenting
step by step procedure to replicate the project”. However, they also figured out that “doing documentation
as you progress through your project is much easier and less stressful than waiting for the end to get it
done all at once.”
software. We used low cost components all the way, which in part led to components failing early,
specifically the moisture sensors. All costs for purchased hardware are listed with unit prices in Table 4.
We have to run a series of tests to find out where it is more feasible in the long run to invest a few
dollars more into a specific component, foremost the corroding humidity sensors, and what the most
resilient hardware setup for the system is.
This project was continued after the summer as a second part of the senior design project that
the students had already been working on during the Spring semester. The students finalized their
software products supporting a more versatile use of the resilient smart garden implementation.
Figure 6 shows the app interface for the Smart Resilient Garden. In addition, the project served as basis
for developing a medium-scale grant proposal for the National Science Foundation (NSF) program
Advanced in Informal STEM Learning (AISL).
Table 4. Overview of hardware and tool expenses.
6. Discussion
• Natural limits: We only had two small planters due to little space and used a simple water bucket
solution with a pump for the automated watering. Outdoors, this would be using grey water.
In addition, we used means like companion planting to increase harvest.
• Economic limits: The constraints of a small budget made us stick to the bare essentials—we were
able to keep the costs at $192, of which $25 were spent on garden ware that can mostly be reused,
about $25 on seedlings and soil, and the rest on the computational and electronics hardware setup.
We are confident that this can be further reduced in the future, as we had to start from scratch
with no reusable old parts of any kind.
• Technical limits: The sensors and boards were very basic and the software had to work with the
limited availability of computing power.
Bridging Disciplines. In many topic areas relevant to limits, we have to bridge disciplines. While we
had only computer science students working on this project, the topic would have lent itself well to
an interdisciplinary team.
Companion Planting. The method mentioned above that we used in the project is companion planting.
It is a technique that helps get the highest possible yield out of a limited amount of land by using
synergies between plants. For example, the first one works as a nitrogen fixer for the second one that,
in turn, provides shade for the first one.
Non-computational Solution Alternatives. There is justified skepticism of approaches for decreasing
consumption of water or other resources that simultaneously employ active means like sensors,
actuators, software, artificial lighting, etc. These are often omitting much simpler, tried-and-true
passive means like tenting/greenhouses, ollas, and increased-organic-matter soils. The research project
at hand uses active means because it was a feasible way to expose computer science students to
a hands-on agricultural topic.
LIMITS thinking emphasizes incentivizing long-term returns [46]. As such, the Resilient Smart
Gardens project contributes to a set of educational blueprints that help a better understanding of how
to grow food in a sustainable way for the future.
6.2. Benefits
6.2.1. Fun
The students had fun doing this project, so it was a research experience that keeps their motivation
and interest up for further research. It was adventurous as the excerpts of the diary show, and they
“made friends” with caterpillars, and had a high level of engagement. One student noted how easy it is
to become a perceived expert in a domain, in that case particularly the gardening domain. Knowing
the most out of a team of four, she had been declared the “expert” early on during the project.
The unexpected “catastrophes” like the flooding of the lab floor due to the corroded sensor as well as
the uninvited guests in form of various little pests on the plants certainly added to the entertainment
factor of the research, and are lessons learned in terms of unforeseen side effects and risks.
Sustainability 2018, 10, 2654 18 of 25
6.2.5. Scalability
It is possible to add another micro controller anytime, and therefore we can add as many
temperature/humidity sensors as we need. The embedded system of the Resilient Smart Garden was
designed with scalability in mind. A single planter can have as many sensors as needed to increase
the accuracy of the readings as long as the micro-controller has enough available pins. The sensor
Sustainability 2018, 10, 2654 19 of 25
readings will be averaged to produce a value that will be sent to the server. The controllers and the
nodeMCU communicate through I2C, meaning up to 128 controllers can theoretically be connected to
a single garden. All extensions of hardware can easily be incorporated into the software by adding
a few lines of code. The logic for the sensor readings and i2c communication will be scaled according
to the amount of hardware that is integrated to the garden system. The amount of water pumps will
depend on the amount of controllers implemented in the garden, as each planter is designated one
water pump. The water pumps will scale along with the controllers but requires planning before
implementing the power delivery system. The power supply will depend on the amount of water
pumps that will be used and the amount of amps it will need. The terminal block that will distribute
the power to the water pumps must also have enough rows for each water pump and the power
supply. Once it has been planned out, the positive and negative wires from the water pump can easily
be placed in a free row in the power terminal strip. Another set of power supply and terminal block
may be added if there is an available power plug on the power strip in the case that further unplanned
expansion is needed.
6.2.7. Wireless
Having wireless communication for flexible placement that is not tethered to Ethernet cable
makes the system’s deployment more versatile. A WiFi connection provides flexible placement of the
garden system. Data collection of moisture, temperature, and humidity sensor readings from other
micro-controller DIY projects are done locally through an Ethernet cable which restricts the placement
of the garden system. The placement of the garden will have to consider the location of the router,
which could result in a lengthy Ethernet cable that would need to be routed. An ethernet cable to
connect the garden and the server is not an ideal situation when placed in an outdoor environment.
Having a WiFi connection will eliminate the limitation of being tethered to a router via Ethernet cable.
It may seem counterintuitive to have a WiFi connection on the garden system when it is tethered to
a power plug, but there is more availability of power plugs in a typical household in comparison to
routers. The garden system is powered through a power strip that provides enough USB plugs for the
micro-controller and nodeMCU. The power strip needs to be plugged into the wall to deliver power to
the garden system. Having a WiFi connection means having one less wire to consider when planning
out the placement of the garden system. The quality of the connection will depend on the location of
the router, but it can be easily extended with a WiFi range extender if needed.
6.3. Limitations
environment has an influence on how frequent the garden is water. Moisture levels remained the same
for a week without any watering. Plant symptoms suggest that the plants were over watered, even
though water was rarely delivered.
Our system was powered from the wall, which can be restricting. In our current solution, we are
limited to powering the system with a wall plug and an extension cord. This restricts us to deploying
the system in an area that can be supplied by extension cord. However, in the next iteration of the
system, we are planning to take it outdoors and use a solar energy source. Most of the DIY projects
do not have a project enclosure. We provide documentation to build a simple project enclosure using
common tools. In current work, we are developing a more weather resistant enclosure that will enable
us to take the project outdoors.
6.3.2. Maintainability
For the longer term use, we had to recalibrate the sensors a few times. One of our water pumps
also burned out as a result of the bucket being emptied, and the system wanting to reach its appropriate
moisture level, but no water ever reached the garden, so the system never shut off the pump, allowing
it run indefinitely in an empty bucket. We also had to refill the bucket multiple times. The Resilient
Smart Garden will automatically provide enough water to keep the plants alive, but it will require
maintenance for proper functionality.
The automatic watering system depends on the moisture sensor and it needs to be functioning
correctly. The moisture sensors will eventually fail from corrosion/oxidation due to the moist
environment, enhanced by the power that is being delivered to the moisture sensors. A failing
moisture sensor gives the garden false readings, which can flood the garden. The life span of the
moisture sensor can be extended by limiting the power duration, but the moisture sensors need to
be replaced as they cannot be repaired. Some research and advice from peers with more expertise on
sensors suggested that we look into alternating currents, which would mean having different voltages
running along each prong of the sensors at different times, to prevent corrosion over time, and looking
into gold-plated sensors.
The moisture sensors need to have accurate readings for the automatic watering system to function
correctly. Each moisture sensor will have different maximum values due to the analog output. Each
moisture sensor will need to be individually calibrated to ensure accurate readings. The calibration
process involves putting the moisture sensor in moist soil and getting the maximum raw value that is
output. The calibration process requires judgment from the user and it may be prone to error if not
properly performed.
The water bucket must have water to ensure that the plants are receiving water and the water
pumps will not burn out. The Resilient Smart Garden was intended for outdoor usage, but this research
was conducted indoors. As a result, the water source for the garden system is a bucket that requires
the user to check and make sure that there is water. There must be water in the bucket for water
delivery system to function as intended. The plants will be put at risk if there is no water in the bucket.
The water pump is also at risk since it will continue to run until the moisture levels are back to normal
values. The water keeps the water pumps cool and will burn out without it.
6.4.1. Outdoors
The first step in future work is to repeat the experiment outdoors with the equipment in
an enclosure as the current version does not have a project enclosure. Options we are currently
exploring are to use a ready-made box, to 3D print one in the on-campus 3D printing lab, or to
repurpose some other materials.
6.5.2. Scalability
As mentioned throughout the report the Resilient Smart Garden can easily be scaled up to include
multiple gardens by adding controllers for each garden. Another opportunity to scale up the project
in the future lies in expanding the Resilient Smart Garden past the garden and into agriculture by
adapting the system to work with different types of irrigation systems [48]. One of the objectives of
this project was to facilitate raising a garden in areas dealing with droughts, like Southern California.
As mentioned by the California Ag Water Stewardship Initiative [48], water quality is no longer the
only concern when it comes to agriculture. With the growing population within California, water
becomes a more limited resource, so the concern is to use sufficient water so that crops get the necessary
amount while minimizing the amount of water used.
While the project at hand had constraints that make it hard to draw conclusions on the water
savings, we are still interested in further investigating the potential for recharging groundwater and
supporting non-crop ecosystems.
Figure 7. Sketch of the growing bed plan for the expanded outdoor version of the project.
7. Conclusions
With a rapidly changing climate, we notice a significant effect on the environment, most noticeable
in the drought-prone state of California. Every year, California faces severe drought during the summer,
sometimes resulting in a state of emergency. Conserving water is crucial, but it is difficult due to
California’s agricultural production. This results in a societal effort to become more sustainable,
motivating individuals to take an interest in growing their own food. Despite the good intentions,
few people have gardening experience and even fewer are educated in water conservation. Others
have attempted to remedy this issue with automated systems; however, they do not account for
scalability or ease of replication for the average consumer. By developing a smart resilient garden
using basic IoT devices, we can promote a sustainable system that anyone can build and use with
minimal difficulty. An open source system will allow the average user to integrate a smart garden into
their homes and promote sustainability and collaboration in community gardens and open source
development for future enhancements.
The objective of the Resilient Smart Garden is to minimize water usage while maintaining
a sustainable environment through automation. The Resilient Smart Garden is built using commercial
off-the-shelf parts, making it accessible to anyone. There are no strict build guidelines, providing
flexible integration. Expansion requires little effort as the hardware is designed to easily scale.
To answer the research question on insights from and challenges for developing a small-scale
resilient smart garden, we can summarize: students profit from a safe-to-fail action research
environment and enjoy self-directed knowledge acquisition and team work. Challenges mainly
arose from a restricted lab environment that imposes impractical constraints.
The contribution of this article is the report of action research for a prototypal implementation of
a multidisciplinary project that supports community resilience. The results make us confident to develop
this into an educational blueprint for projects that connect computer science to sustainability domains.
Sustainability 2018, 10, 2654 23 of 25
Author Contributions: Conceptualization, B.P.; Methodology, B.P.; Software, C.J.P., M.S., R.M., and L.T.;
Validation, B.P.; Investigation, C.J.P., M.S., L.T., R.M., and B.P.; Resources, B.P.; Data Curation, R.M.;
Writing—Original Draft Preparation, all authors; Writing—Review and Editing, B.P.; Visualization, C.J.P., M.S.,
R.M., and L.T.; Supervision, B.P.; Project Administration, B.P.,C.J.P.; Funding Acquisition, B.P.
Funding: This research was supported by a CSULB 2017 Recreational Scholarly and Creative Activities Faculty
Small Grant.
Acknowledgments: The authors would like to thank Margo McCall for reporting on the project in the CSULB
College of Engineering News Blog https://web.csulb.edu/colleges/coe/news/?p=11779 and for her gardening
advice. Furthermore, we would like to thank Libby Gustin and Christian Anza for their valuable advice when
designing this project.
Conflicts of Interest: The authors declare no conflict of interest. The founding sponsors had no role in the design
of the study; in the collection, analyses, or interpretation of data; in the writing of the manuscript, and in the
decision to publish the results.
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